


Predictability

by thegables



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pneumonia, Sickfic, So much love!, brief mention of torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-13 17:40:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29405649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegables/pseuds/thegables
Summary: Mycroft comes back from a mysterious summit with pneumonia, and Greg is there to take care of him.Plot what plot? Just #romanticconcern.
Relationships: Mycroft Holmes/Greg Lestrade
Comments: 32
Kudos: 128





	Predictability

Greg’s been home for hours by the time Mycroft gets back. He comes in quietly, nodding at Greg on the couch as he goes straight to the closet to put away his coat and gloves.

“Hi,” Greg says without getting up. He always takes a minute to let Mycroft settle when he gets home. Mycroft’s not the most transparent person, and he doesn’t snap or rage when he’s upset, and never takes his stress out on Greg. If anything, he internalizes it all the more. This makes it difficult to see how he’s feeling.

Tonight it’s after midnight, and Mycroft looks tired, his hair limp and face pale. His suit is as prim and perfect as ever, but his posture is a little stooped. “I did try to be home earlier,” he says finally, and his voice is tired too.

“I know, love.” Greg opens his arm, gesturing for his partner to join him on the sofa.

Mycroft complies, collapsing neatly next to Greg’s feet. His eyes far away, staring at nothing, he begins to unfasten his tie.

Greg sits up from his little after-work nest. “At least let me do that,” he says, teasing if not exactly gunning for anything.

Mycroft huffs. “I’m afraid I’m not much of a present to unwrap, this evening.”

It’s a dismissive comment, meant to clarify that he’s too tired for any funny business tonight, which should go without saying. But Greg also hears Mycroft’s lingering insecurity in it. They’ve been together for years, but Mycroft still worries that he’s not fun, spontaneous, laid back enough for Greg. That he works too hard and comes home too exhausted for Friday night sex. He hardly ever voices these fears, so Greg doesn’t get a lot of opportunities to remind him that he loves him as he is, that he doesn’t want an imaginary, other Mycroft, just this one.

“Don’t need a present,” he mumbles, and crawls up to kiss his love’s ear. “Just help you wind down.”

Mycroft lets his head fall back. “I’d appreciate it.”

His neck and jaw, exposed to the light, are rough with ruddy stubble. He shaved this morning at six and is only now getting home. Greg takes the opportunity to swipe his cheek and lips over it, just enjoying the sensation. “Hi,” he says, and unfastens the tie.

Mycroft opens his eyes, with difficulty, to frown at Greg. “Gregory,” he says, pretending to be stern. A lifetime of fondness shines through anyway.

Greg pulls the tie off him, unbuttons his top few buttons, and press a kiss to his Adam’s apple. “The negotiations aren’t going well,” he observes, kneading three fingers into Mycroft’s shoulder, where he finds an ever-present knot.

Mycroft turns his head sharply to muffle a cough in his fist. “Not particularly, no,” he says after a moment. “I have to go St. Petersburg in the morning.”

Greg’s stomach sinks. He’d hoped to spend the whole weekend on this couch, watching films and reading and lazily kissing until they finally give in and head upstairs to the bed. Mycroft needs it as bad as he does.

Maybe more. “I’m—” he clears his throat. “I’m very sorry, Gregory.”

“Can’t wait, eh?” Greg knows it can’t wait. It never can, when it’s Mycroft.

Mycroft grimaces, a fierce expression on his pliable face. He looks older than he did a year ago, Greg thinks suddenly. The lines at the corners of his eyes, his mouth, are deepening. He looks lovely, of course, always does. But tired too. “I’m afraid it can’t. I will make up the weekend to you, of course.” This is a policy he has, one he instituted when they were first dating, though Greg never holds him to it. He’s never resented Mycroft’s work; his own is unpredictable enough to sympathize.

“Make up your sleep to me,” Greg says, cuffing his hand around the back of Mycroft’s neck, warm and human and neatly shaved. “You’re exhausted.”

“It’s a good idea. I’m on the jet tomorrow at seven.” Mycroft rises, his movements elegant as ever, and extends a hand to help Greg up. At the last minute he turns and buries another cough in his elbow.

“You alright, love?”

“Mm, yes.” Mycroft retrieves his tie from the arm of the sofa. “Merely clearing my throat.”

Greg doesn’t exactly buy it. He knows Mycroft’s been burning the candle pretty intensely the last few weeks, and he knows how he gets; his immune system’s never been the best. But he can also sense Mycroft’s fragility at the moment. He doesn’t want to nag at him before he leaves town. “Bed,” is all he says as they head up the stairs.

They have a precious few minutes in bed, where Mycroft turns out the lamp, and then rolls over to lay his head on Greg’s chest, one arm thrown over Greg’s waist. Heat builds stuffily between their joined bodies and the duvet, and Greg kisses the top of his head, and scrapes his fingertips over Mycroft’s shoulder, and they lay that way until Mycroft falls asleep and Greg’s arm goes numb, both of which take roughly the same amount of time.

It’s a good system, all around.

~~~

If Mycroft is coughing more, or seems ill, in the morning, Greg’s afraid he doesn’t notice it. He’s getting ready for work himself, trying to shave and make coffee simultaneous, and half-yelling from the bathroom, “Know when you’ll be back?”

“Not soon enough,” Mycroft says, which means he doesn’t know, and he won’t make promises he can’t keep.

They linger in the kitchen for a moment before leaving. They don’t say _I love you_ often, though they know well enough how they feel about each other. Instead Greg says, “Call if you can.”

“I’ll do my best,” Mycroft says, and grabs Greg’s coffee mug before he tips it too far and spills it down his shirt. He can’t help it; all he’s looking at is Mycroft’s face.

“Oops.”

“Forward your warrant requests to Anthea if you have trouble,” he says as he kisses Greg briefly and goes out the door, and Greg knows that that’s not at all what he means.

~~~

Mycroft doesn’t call or text or email for three days, and Greg tries not to worry. He always fails at this, no matter how much he reminds himself of Mycroft’s security budget or how tired he is himself. But something seemed different this time, too. There’s been an international Problem brewing the last few months, something his partner can’t talk about, and it’s kept him out late often, working at home just as much. Sometimes Greg wakes up in the night to find Mycroft in his office, not working but doodling on pieces of printer paper like he does when he’s truly stymied. Which is rare. Used to be rare.

On the fourth day, he gets a call from Anthea. “I don’t know what he’s told you, but I’m monitoring the situation,” she says, instantly sending Greg’s pulse through the roof.

“I _haven’t_ heard from him, what’s going on?”

She huffs in the phone. “I told him to call. Everything’s alright. He’s a bit under the weather.”

“Ah.” A blade of guilt slices between Greg’s ribs. He had the chance to notice and he brushed it off.

“Trying to work through it, obviously. The problem is…” She pauses, like she’s not sure how much to tell Greg. She seems to give in. “Ever since a pronounced instance of—what do the Americans call it? _Enhanced interrogation_ , many years ago, every cold he gets goes straight to his chest.”

A stab of worry, much worse than before, takes Greg’s breath. Of course Mycroft never said. He feels horrible that he didn’t know. Then again, it’s not like Mycroft to confess his weaknesses, even to Greg. Especially to Greg. “Enhanced—”

“Don’t ask,” she interrupts.

Greg scrapes his free hand over his face. “‘Straight to his chest,’” he repeats.

“Mm.”

“Bronchitis?”

“Might tend that way. As I say, I’m monitoring the situation. He refuses to wear the hat.”

Greg can’t help a smile at the thought of Mycroft, red-nosed or not, in one of those furry Russian hats. “Thanks, Anthea.”

“Of course.”

“Can I speak to him?”

The phone muffles for a moment, but he can hear Anthea say, “Sir?”

A moment later, Mycroft’s voice, thin and hoarse. “Gregory, I only have a moment.”

Greg’s chest hurts for him. He sounds awful. “Oh, love,” he says.

“I asked Anthea not to worry you,” he says, and puts the phone down to cough. Greg can hear it: harsh and chesty.

Greg’s eyes sting with worry, with missing him. “It’s my privilege to worry about you. One I take rather seriously.”

Mycroft doesn’t speak right away. Greg tries hard to picture his face, tries to imagine what his expression looks like right now. Finally he says, “I’ll be home as soon as I can.” He doesn’t add, _with you, in bed, head on your chest, drowsy with cough medicine, hands under your T-shirt_ , but Greg knows what he means.

“I know,” Greg says, his own voice hoarse with emotion. “Please take care of yourself.”

“Anthea sees to that, I assure you.” His voice dries up, and he clears his throat in a painful little attempt to be heard. “Gregory. I must sign off, I’m afraid.”

“Yeah, of course. I—I’ll see you soon, yeah?”

“Certainly,” Mycroft says, as if the question is ridiculous, as if Greg has nothing to worry about, but his voice is fragile and congested. Greg hangs up the phone feeling a hundred times worse. Mycroft has never been the best at taking care of himself, especially in the midst of a political crisis, and there’s only so much Anthea can do. He wonders what Mycroft endured to make his colds “go to his chest.” If he has weak lungs, he’s definitely never said. Greg feels torn between his anxiety and a strange resentful temper, like he doesn’t know his partner at all.

~~~

Greg doesn’t hear from either of them at all the next two days, until finally he gets a text from Anthea, which reads: _Definitely bronchitis. I’m fast-tracking the meds and making him sleep. We’re not able to cut the summit short at risk of major fallout, but will conclude ASAP. This conversation never took place._

 _Fuck_ , he texts back. _Thanks for letting me know._

 _Letting you know what_? She replies at once.

Greg holds on to that tiny sliver of humor. Anthea wouldn’t joke if the sky wasn’t falling. It’s the only reassurance he has.

~~~

But he can’t help it. On a crime scene with Sherlock and John in the morning, he asks pulls Sherlock off to the side and says, “Has your brother… ever been tortured?”

Sherlock blinks, as if the question’s never truly occurred to him. “I imagine so.”

“You don’t _know_?”

“Mycroft’s not big on sharing, and I’m not a big _guesser_ ,” Sherlock says, voice full of disdain. “Trauma often makes people unpleasant, personally, so it’s possible.”

“Sherlock!” Greg and John say at the same time.

Sherlock huffs, and screws up his face. “To be honest, Lestrade, I don’t in actual fact find thinking about my brother being tortured to be an especially pleasing activity, regardless of our disagreements, so forgive me for making a joke.”

This is unusually self-aware and to the point for Sherlock, so much so that Greg doesn’t respond right away. Finally he says, “He’s in St. Petersburg, has been for days, and he’s not well. Apparently.”

Sherlock frowns. “Pneumonia?”

A spike of anxiety goes through Greg. Sherlock apparently knows enough to know it would be his lungs. How many times has Mycroft had pneumonia? It’s not exactly common for otherwise healthy adult men. “Bronchitis, Anthea says.”

Sherlock glances at John, almost furtive. “Not for long,” he says under his breath.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“My brother has many bad qualities,” he said, steps over to the corpse, and starts fishing in the dead man’s coat pockets.

“ _Sherlock_.”

“His lungs are among them.” He reaches into a trouser pocket and brings out an old-fashioned skeleton key, holds it to the light. “Get him back to London as soon as possible, Lestrade. Given his undeniable weakness for your interests, you’re probably the only one who can.” He straightens up and surveys the scene for John Watson. “John! The vault!”

John, who’s only heard half this conversation, groans and heads for the car. Greg is left alone with a corpse on his hands, no real leads, and the rising fear that his boyfriend might be ill beyond what he’s even worried so far.

~~~

His fears are confirmed when Anthea calls early the next morning. “Can you meet us at London Bridge Hospital?” She’s always curt and businesslike, but there’s a clipped deadness to her tone that makes Greg go cold.

“What is he—what is it?”

“Detective Inspector. Can you meet us there? One hour?”

“Of-of course. I’ll be there in half an hour.”

“He’ll want you,” she says, the most sentimental thing he’s ever heard her say, and then the call is disconnected.

He spends the entire trip to the hospital thinking about how he’s going to convince some hospital lackey that he should be allowed in to see his gay high-level spy lover, no, not married, but we’re _partners it’s been years, apparently_ torture _is involved, I’ll die if I can’t—_.

Greg floated the idea of marriage, once, a year or two in, just gauging interest.

Mycroft had raised his eyebrows, pleasantly neutral. “Would the interference of the state influence your feelings about this relationship?” He’d said, but without particular malice. Just because Mycroft’s voice is snide sometimes doesn’t mean he’s actually passing judgment.

Greg had thought about the question. “Not really. Been there. Didn’t help anything.”

Mycroft had nodded. “As I thought,” and gone back to reading.

“But just to clarify,” Greg had blurted, and immediately gotten shy, “There’s not going to be anybody else for me. This is as serious as it gets.”

Mycroft had blushed quite pleasingly, the way he often did before orgasm or when Greg gave him a well-chosen gift. He’d opened his mouth and closed it again. “I approach everything seriously. None more than you,” he’d said, and then things had devolved toward the bed and they’d never said anything else about the matter.

Now Greg is wondering if they should have foreseen this possibility. The romantic thing about marriage, he knows, is the red tape. All the paperwork that _proves_ it, that makes it utterly clear that you’re entangled with another person in every mundane way. He doesn’t have that claim on Mycroft. If he died in Russia, Greg thinks suddenly with the sensation of falling, would anyone but Anthea even know to let him know?

Then he gets to the hospital and says, _I’m Mycroft Holmes’ partner_ and the receptionist says _you’re on the list, third room on the left, show your ID_ , and he says, _oh_.

He should have known that Mycroft would be able to prepare for a problem like this one. He doesn’t want to let “the state interfere in this relationship” because he’s interfered enough in the state already. He makes the rules. Greg’s heart feels tight with fondness even as he dashes down the corridor to Mycroft’s room.

Anthea is there, on her phone as usual. There are no security offers, just their driver outside the door, so apparently no attempt has been made on Mycroft’s life. Anthea looks up and relief colors her always-impassive face. “Thank goodness,” she says, “he’ll want you here when he wakes up.”

“What is it, I came as soon as you said—” He’s turning already, seeing Mycroft pale as death in the hospital bed. There are thick blankets bunched up over his knees, pushed toward the end of the bed. There’s an IV in his arm, a heart monitor on his thumb and two wires hooked up to pads on his chest. Worst of all, there’s an oxygen mask over his face. He looks like a shadow of a person.

Anthea flicks her eyes over to Mycroft but doesn’t get up. “Pneumonia,” she says quietly. “We couldn’t get the fever down.”

“ _Christ_.”

“He fought me at every turn. I promise you, I tried to cut the trip short, I tried to keep him inside—.”

Greg’s head swivels back to her. “He went _outside_ like this.”

She massages her temples with both hands. “He tried to ignore the fever. The coughing and difficulty breathing were harder to brush off.”

Greg winces. “I don’t blame you. It’s not your fault.”

She smiles weakly.

“He’s impossible.” He turns back to Mycroft’s bedside. His love is so _limp_ in the bed. This close up, Greg can see that his face is flushed with fever, and that there’s a cold pack tucked against both his sides. There’s a rising fury in Greg’s chest, an anger that has no outlets, no point of entry or exit. He swallows it down the best he can. Then he drags one of the wretched hospital chairs to the side of the bed. He’s going to be here when Mycroft wakes up.

Which he does only moments later, coughing himself awake. They’re deep and resonant in his chest, a rattling, barking noise that makes Greg’s blood run cold.

Mycroft struggles up on one elbow, disoriented. He starts to pluck at the oxygen mask and then, realizing what it is, leaves it in place. Finally his delirious eyes fix on Greg. “Oh,” he breathes, and then doubles over with coughs again that wrack his whole body.

Greg grabs for his hand, which is burning up. _I’m here_ , he could say, or _breathe_ , or _everything’s alright now_ , but he can’t. Mycroft is economical with words himself, does’t say things he doesn’t mean or that aren’t true, can’t be verified. Sometimes he won’t say the things that he means the most. Greg feels convicted by that standard right now. He can’t say anything to make the situation better. He sits here and holds his hand.

Finally, finally, Mycroft works through the coughing. He takes slow, crackly breaths that sound incredibly painful. Greg can see his oxygen stats on a monitor by the bed, and while he’s not a doctor they seem non-dire, but this doesn’t help him calm down much. He rubs his thumb over the back of Mycroft’s hand again and again.

Mycroft’s voice comes as a surprise. It’s feeble and breathy, but it’s him alright. “I feel profoundly stupid,” he rasps.

Greg, overcome, chuckles joylessly into their clasped hands. “I can’t—I am so angry with you.”

Mycroft takes a sharp breath, one that makes him wince profoundly. His audible heart monitor spikes briefly with the pain. “Justified,” he says. “Perhaps we could have this castigation when I am not—ahem. Drowning.”

“ _Mycroft_ , love.”

“Not fatally.” His eyelids flutter and close. “Not fatally, Gregory.”

Greg knows that it’s a question, refusing to present as one. His eyes burn. “Of course not.”

“I am not at present my most firm-willed,” Mycroft says, and coughs. His shoulder shake.Greg can’t help but stretch a hand out to brace him. He feels far too thin, all bone and sinew. Greg casts a look over his shoulder at Anthea, who nods to suggest that she’s already called the nurse.

“Rest,” Greg says, “sleep, if you can.”

“Don’t let them put me in an ice bath,” Mycroft mumbles, sniffling.

“I won’t,” Greg says, though he’s unfamiliar with both that particular practice and with any other treatment for pneumonia. “I’m right here, I’m staying.”

Mycroft nods, and his chest swells as he fights through a deep breath, but then his eyes slip closed, and he sleeps again.

~~~

The fever spikes while he’s asleep, goes over 103, and there is a constant stream of doctors and nurses with clipboards and medications and icepacks. Greg could have gone his entire life without seeing Mycroft Holmes, the British Government, who governs Greg’s sex life and sock drawer with equal, compelling severity, delirious with fever. It’s the worst thing he’s ever seen.

They get the fever down eventually, and tell Greg and Anthea that he will probably sleep for several more hours. Greg eventually dozes off in the chair by his side. Some time later, he hears Sherlock and John’s voices through his thin sleep. John is saying, “They say as soon as his saturation goes up a bit more, he can graduate from the mask.”

There’s a rustling noise. Apparently Sherlock is snooping through Mycroft’s personal effects, and Anthea must not be there to stop him, because he says, “A three-alarm fire, clearly. He was trying to play both sides of the negotiation. Pit enemy factions against each other.”

“What does that matter now?” John asks, but he’s not irritated.

“It doesn’t,” Sherlock says, and his voice is flatter than usual. He sounds, unbelievably, concerned. “I’m putting together a sequence of events, John. Mycroft’s tiresome machinations merely give us evidence as to how he let this happen. Playing both sides means more late night meetings, more covert conversations on smoke breaks, outdoors, more vodka. He’s been incredibly reckless.”

John shushes him, but his heart isn’t in it. “It wouldn’t be Mycroft if he was putting his own comfort first.”

“It wouldn’t be Mycroft if he didn’t meddle in everything and make it a thousand times worse,” Sherlock retorts, but Greg can tell, even half-asleep, that his heart isn’t in it. Sherlock is worried too.

Somebody else comes into the room. “Who’s the next of kin for Mr. Holmes?”

“Unfortunately that would be me,” Sherlock says, “but talk to the boyfriend. If you can wake him up.”

Greg stirs, embarrassed. Anthea is gone. The doctor doesn’t have much to report, only what John was telling Sherlock. Since the fever’s down, everybody seems much calmer.

John goes to get them all cups of coffee. Sherlock keeps himself busy rummaging through the contents of Mycroft’s pockets, but turns up only tissues, fresh and used, cough drop wrappers, his burner phone, and a blister packet of cold medicine. There’s something about these souvenirs of his week abroad that make Greg impossibly sad. “How did you know it would be pneumonia?” He asks Sherlock, breaking a longstanding personal policy, to never ask Sherlock Holmes, if he can help it, _how did you know_?

Sherlock’s knowing gaze flicks to Greg, and then at his brother, sleeping restlessly in the center of the room. Then he says, “Mycroft’s seen a lot of things that you know nothing about, Lestrade.”

Greg harumphs. “I’m perfect aware, he’s a man of mystery. If you mean the torture—.”

“I mean that he is very used to sacrificing personal wellbeing to the nation. He views this as selflessness. It isn’t.”

“No?”

“There are lots of different ways to be selfish.” Sherlock’s eyes move to the doorway, through which John has recently exited. Greg can guess the source of this knowledge. “Mycroft is perfectly willing to sacrifice his own health and wellbeing on a pyre to the British state because it satisfies his martyr complex. His sense of importance.” They’re quiet for a moment. “He’s an idiot, of course. Impossible to feel important when your lungs are full of fluid.”

Greg winces. Finally he says, “That’s a pretty harsh take on your brother’s worldview while he’s. Well. Like this.”

Sherlock blinks, as if harshness has been the furthest thing from his mind. “I am the same, of course.”

“What?”

John comes back in then, balancing three cups of coffee between his hands, saying, “Here we are, now,” and Sherlock just looks at Greg significantly.

When Mycroft wakes up a few minutes later, coughing and hacking, Sherlock says to him, “If you try Lestrade’s patience like this it’s going to mean a lot more hospital hours for me. Do be considerate, brother mine.”

“Thank you for your concern,” Mycroft croaks, and though his voice is still ruined there is a spark of his real self in the retort. Greg has to hide a smile.

John fills Mycroft in on the doctor’s orders and gives his own opinion. Before they leave, he says, “You will take it much easier than you think you need to, and you’ll listen to Greg.”

There’s something about this little order that makes Greg want to cry. He’s been entrusted with the care of this impossible, important, brilliant man, and everybody knows it. No one finds it strange. “Thank you,” he says, his own voice thin. John and Sherlock take their leave.

Finally, for the first time in a week, Greg and Mycroft are alone. Mycroft takes one long, greedy look at him, his expression teeming with feeling. He opens his mouth to speak, and a long, sputtering coughing fit comes out instead. He’s pushed forward with the force of it, one hand over his mouth. It’s an awful, wet sound.

Greg rubs his back in aimless spirals, feeling his shoulder blades too keenly.

With one hand still over his mouth, Mycroft looks sheepishly for the wad of tissues that had been by the bed. The nurse has come to tidy while he was sleeping, and she’s left a basin instead for him to spit into. Greg hands it to him.

Mycroft winces. He blushes so much it’s distinct from the fever flush. “I couldn’t possibly,” he mumbles.

“Don’t be ridiculous. You have to get that stuff out of your lungs. It has to go somewhere.”

Mycroft gives an absent-minded cough and they can both hear the rattle of congestion in his chest.

“See?”

“Leave, then.” Mycroft won’t look at him.

Greg is abruptly angry. “Don’t be absurd.”

Mycroft, his cheeks red, spits without further discussion. After a few minutes he says, “I can hardly hope to maintain an air of—.” He stops, takes a painful deep breath, regroups. “I’m not immune to vanity,” he says finally, “particularly when you are concerned.”

Greg can hear the raging insecurity underneath the formal admission. He sighs, all his frustration washed away in a moment. He grabs for Mycroft’s hand, which is strangely cold, and puts the basin on the bedside table. “Love,” he says. He doesn’t know where to begin, doesn’t know how to undo forty years of loneliness and self-hatred in one remark made in this overly bright hospital room. He doesn’t even know how to say _I love you_ outside of their own house. He’s not sure Mycroft even wants to hear that here. But he can sense the force of his partner’s distress, intensifying and muddling the discomfort of the infection wracking his system.

“I can’t believe you care so much what I think of you,” he says finally, because it’s true.

Mycroft huffs, his throat thick. “May I have a tissue for its original purpose, at least?” He asks, eyes down, and Greg hands him his own handkerchief in time for Mycroft to cover two heavy sneezes. On top of the hospital-worthy infection, he still, technically, has a cold.

When Mycroft’s blown his nose, Greg finds him a box of tissues so he doesn’t have to worry. Then he says, “Seriously though. I think you might have to contemplate the unfortunate reality that your vanity is not going to remain intact for our entire relationship.”

Mycroft makes a face that means _I know, don’t be absurd._ If Greg isn’t mistaken, his breathing is starting to sound a little easier.

“And that you wouldn’t have to be worried about me seeing you—like this, if you had rested when you first got ill. God, Mycroft, I was so scared.”

Mycroft’s eyes flash. “Then Anthea is fired.”

Greg gives a little, helpless laugh. “I’m not talking to you anymore. Rest, please. Rest knowing I’m not going anywhere, no matter if your cough is unpleasant or not.”

“Now is not the time for heavy-handed proclamations, Gregory,” Mycroft says, his eyes closing, meaning, _thank you,_ _I love you more than I can say._

~~~

Mycroft sleeps on and off for the rest of the day, waking up for an X ray that confirms fairly severe, but not life-threatening, pneumonia. Greg talks to Donovan and Gregson on the phone, offering advice on his open cases but making it very clear that he won’t be in for the next few days. Donovan, quite cheerfully, offers to have the contents of his in-tray mailed to his house. It wasn’t the way he intended to spend the week, listening to his partner cough up a lung while he does endless paperwork, but it’ll have to do for now.

He’s sent home for the night by the hospital staff; it’s against policy for him to sleep in the room. Mycroft manages to convince him to obey this rule, but not by much. It feels beyond stupid to leave him there in that cold, unfeeling room while he’s so sick. “You will get to enjoy the nighttime soundtrack of my respiratory system soon enough,” Mycroft deadpans. “Go.”

He does, but he’s back at 9 am. The fever has risen again during the night, Mycroft’s body struggling to fight the virus, and for a long time nurses and doctors come and go often while Mycroft tosses and turns, his face gleaming with sweat. Anthea arrives halfway through, takes one look at Greg, and says, “What do you need?”

She’s back in an hour with lunch and informs him that she’s equipped his flat with the things they’ll need when Mycroft is released.

The fever nearly breaks at 3 pm. It’s not normal, and his breathing is still labored, but he can sit up and focus for longer periods, no longer overcome by chills and heat flashes. It’s immensely reassuring.

But after a few hours, his spike of energy flags. The constant work of coughing drains him, Greg can see, and he’s in a good deal of pain. Then there are the mundane indignities of being in hospital. Even in a wing and hospital as elite as Mycroft could select, doctors and nurses come and go; the fluorescent lights stay on and the door open; people pass in the corridors deep in conversation; there is the constant whir of beeps and machines. Mycroft asks Anthea for hours to bring him a laptop or file to occupy his time; she refuses. “For national security, it’s not recommended, sir.”

“Not to mention for your _chronic lung infection_ ,” Greg drawls.

Mycroft ignores him and sighs. He is as afflicted by boredom at Sherlock is, though he hides it marginally better. Greg’s just relieved that he’s present enough to feel boredom.

It wanes, however, as the evening wears on. It’s dark outside but the light and hospital smell are overwhelming. Sherlock returns, apparently at John’s behest, and spends most of the time tormenting Greg about cold cases, with occasional insults-as-concern directed at Mycroft. Anthea has two tablets and three phones laid out on a side table and she’s texting furiously in Russian. A doctor comes by to give long and digressive advice about taking it easy for the next three to six weeks. A nurse comes in to check Mycroft’s temperature, change his sheets, give him his pills.

At one point the room contains eight people. Greg’s boyfriend has a burst blood vessel in his eye from coughing so hard. There’s an expression on his face that is utterly familiar: the tension in the forehead and between the eyes, the flat, unhappy mouth, that signal a burgeoning headache, a bad one. He looks overwhelmed and weary and completely unequal to the task of finding rest. He can’t even stand up for himself enough to demand quiet. A wave of protectiveness crashes over Greg all at once. He hates watching this.

“Sherlock, with all respect, sod off.” He gets up and moves into the middle of the room. “All of you, clear out, please. Clearly Mr. Holmes’ treatment is in hand, can’t you see he needs to rest? He hasn’t had a single moment to himself since he was admitted, and the _noise_ in here. Please, yes, sorry ma’am—” He shoos out the nurses and doctor, Anthea and Sherlock too. He can’t close the door, but he pulls the curtain across it. He turns off one set of lights.

Mycroft’s eyes are closed with relief, his chest rising and falling with slow, labored breaths. He looks so small in the bed, swimming in the hospital gown and copious blankets from the last round of chills. Love and fear choke Greg for a moment as he approaches; he can’t speak. He holds Mycroft’s thin, unshaven cheek in his hand for a moment, infinitely gentle. “I can go too,” he says quietly. “I’m sure you’d like some time alone.”

Mycroft stifles a cough in his throat. His eyes are still closed. “I—thank you. Would you—I’d like you to stay.”

It’s the most halting, uncertain request Greg has ever heard him make.

Nothing like the first time they slept together, when all of Mycroft’s hints and glances coalesced into a calm, bossy suggestion, one that had taken Greg utterly by surprise and upended his life. _Might I suggest, Detective Inspector, that we help each other let off some steam? I suspect that we are sexually compatible and I’m curious if you’ve come to the same conclusion._

He’d said yes, because when Mycroft Holmes offers you something you take it. And you say thank you. Quite possibly you say _yes, oh my god, yes, right there, yes_. At least twice.

That was three years ago. They haven’t been without hardship, or insecurity, but Greg has never seen Mycroft broken down like this. “Of course, love,” he says, his voice thick with emotion. He kisses Mycroft’s sweaty forehead, sweeps his hair back. “Of course I’ll stay.”

They end up breaking hospital protocol entirely when Mycroft coaxes him up into the bed with him, curved around his back so he doesn’t upset any of the tubes or monitors. Greg sits up on one hip to pull the thick blankets back over them. He kisses Mycroft’s shoulder blade, plants his hand possessively on Mycroft’s slim hip, and then slings it over his waist. “Alright?” He murmurs. This close he can hear each rattly breath.

“Yes,” Mycroft says, and coughs into his fist. “Alright now.”

Greg scoots his hips forward so he’s pressed even closer against Mycroft’s back, sharing his warmth. “Sleep,” he says into the gown, and they both do.

~~~

Mycroft is discharged the next day, still weak enough to let Anthea see him sit with his head slumped on Greg’s shoulder during the ride home. Greg tries to convince him to be carried in, but he refuses in his tone that means no further conversation will be fruitful. But Greg walks right behind him, one arm hovering under his elbow. Mycroft doesn’t falter, but his steps are slow and careful. He sits down on the sofa to cough.

Anthea flits in the kitchen, making tea and arranging medicines, and then she smiles at Greg from the door, mouths, _call me_. He nods, his hand at the small of Mycroft’s back.

When the door closes behind her, Mycroft lets himself collapse into Greg, burying his face in Greg’s shirt. He’s no longer in danger, but each deep breath sounds terrible. It will be a long road to full health again.

Greg, in his own home with his arms around Mycroft, the two of them together and alone, feels a thousand times better already. “Just us, now,” he says. “Just rest.”

Mycroft straightens a bit, clearing his throat. “I’m afraid I owe you a whole host of apologies,” he murmurs. “I am thoroughly embarrassed.”

“Hush.” Greg’s arms tighten around him. “Don’t be daft. Do you want to go up to bed? Stay here?”

Mycroft huffs. “I’d greatly appreciate the opportunity to be out of bed for a few minutes.”

“That’s fine, just—here.” He maneuvers them so Mycroft is lying down, his head and chest propped up against Greg so he doesn’t feel choked with congestion.

Mycroft turns to press his face against Greg’s shoulder, less a kiss than a reminder of closeness. He’s breathing Greg in, Greg realizes. His own chest feels tight. “You have nothing to apologize for,” he whispers. “And nothing to be embarrassed about. I just want you to get better.”

Mycroft flinches away suddenly to cough, trying to direct it as far from Greg’s direction as possible, which is absurd. “I should realize that sometimes IV antibiotics are a necessary part of international diplomacy,” he deadpans, his voice still hoarse.

Greg gives a little laugh-sigh. “I’ve told you that for years.”

Mycroft straightens up a little to look at his face. “Do you know what Anthea said to me, in a—in an unpleasant moment? Struggling to breathe, having—struggling to remain consciousness in a private airport in Moscow?”

Greg doesn’t answer the question, too caught up in the awful mental image that’s been conjured.

Mycroft goes on anyway. “We were both very… unnerved. Exhausted. She just said your name. Two or three times.”

Greg’s eyes close of their own accord as tears fill them.

“It was the only superstitious thing I’ve ever heard her say. And it was rather superstitious. It did nothing to ameliorate the situation. And yet—.”

“I love you,” Greg says, “so much.” He knows that’s what he’s being told.

“Yes,” is all Mycroft says. He kisses the shoulder of Greg’s jumper.

They both fall asleep on the sofa within minutes and don’t wake up until it’s starting to get dark. 

~~~

When Greg stirs, Mycroft is blinking awake, suddenly torn by a ragged gasp of an inhale. He sits up in a hurry, bending at the waist to cough. Greg can hear the rattle in his lungs, settled in while Mycroft’s been sleeping. It takes him a long minute to get his breath back. Greg brings him the tissues and rubs his back. He knows Mycroft won’t want any attention brought to it. When the coughing subsides, Greg says, “Up to bed, I think.”

Mycroft nods, in too much pain to protest.

When he’s settled in upstairs, with tea and soup and so many blankets that he casts Greg a wry, teasing look, they sit together in their bed. Greg suddenly feels the stress of the week settle down around him. For the first time he allows himself to contemplate the magnitude of what’s happened—the sight of Mycroft in that hospital bed, flushed and out of his head with fever, getting by on artificial oxygen. Mycroft losing consciousness in a hospital in Moscow when Greg had thought he’d simply had a bad cold. His eyes squeeze shut. He feels so fragile—like one shove would send him into sobs.

Mycroft’s hand comes up to cup his jaw, massage his neck. “You’re wrecked,” he rasps.

“I’m fine,” he says automatically.

“Hospitals are not good for anyone’s health.”

Greg manages a smile. “I was so—. I don’t want you to feel guilty. But Christ. I was so afraid.”

Mycroft’s eyes are far away. He rubs his fingertips over his mouth, an unconscious thinking gesture so characteristic of him that Greg’s stomach hurts. After a long time Mycroft says, “I feel guilty because I have done wrong. Not by being ill, but by concealing the extent of it from you—and by refusing to acknowledge it, making it worse. If I had come home with bronchitis five days ago, sod the summit…” He shakes his head, stifles a cough. “The only reason I survived as long as I did, made the inroads I needed to, was through imagining you, this room—. Well.” He swallows. Mycroft is not known for his proclamations. Greg knows him well enough to know where they are are, though, under the surface.

Greg holds his hand, feeling unable to continue without touching him in some way. “Anthea said—” he starts hesitantly. “That your lungs are weak because of an ordeal you had some years ago. You don’t have to tell me.”

Mycroft grimaces. “I did many unwise things before I knew you. Or before I knew you—intimately. Although I suspect that your imagination is making it more spectacular than it is.”

“Mm?”

“I was not tortured, if that’s what she implied. I was briefly imprisoned, already ill, and things were exacerbated before I could be extracted. I was in some serious danger, that time. Since then, if I am not careful, I can make myself a burden on the NHS too easily. And a burden on you.”

“Love—.”

Mycroft closes his eyes, takes a careful deep breath. It’s clear that even this brief conversation has exhausted him. “I have learned something valuable, Gregory, I assure you. I know that to take care of myself is to take care of you. It would be callous to do otherwise, knowing that you—care for me. As I know you do, miraculously. By some strange miracle.”

Greg is working furiously to hold his tears back. He leans forward to kiss Mycroft’s pale, chapped lips, lovely as always. “I love you so much,” he says hoarsely.

“And I you. Enough to consider ending decades of self-destructive tendencies, it seems.” His smile is fragile and self-deprecating and so beautiful.

Greg huffs and throws his arms around his boyfriend. “Do it for yourself. Me second. Anthea third.”

Mycroft laughs, triggering a cough. Finally he says, “As you please. Ducks in a row, Gregory.”

“Rest, now, please. Neither of us is leaving this bed for a few days. I’m bringing the TV upstairs.”

“What are we watching?” Mycroft is already falling asleep.

“Football, and _Rosemary and Thyme_ , and the news, and probably _Women’s Hour_ if you’re bad, and rugby, and _Midsomer Murders_ if you’re good.”

“I like the predictability,” Mycroft murmurs, a smile flickering over his face as his shoulders slump.

“Sleep,” Greg says, “I’ll give you predictable. I’ll be here when you wake up.”

And he is. 

**Author's Note:**

> Come say hi on tumblr at thegables.tumblr.com.


End file.
